“AND THE adventure begins,” I snarled. No one clapped this time.
I took a step.
Nothing.
And then another.
Nothing.
And then another.
Still nothing. I breathed a sigh of relief. I held my head up and looked north.
“Oh shoot,” Gary said. “I forgot my—”
“Gary!” I shouted at him.
“Kidding, kidding. Jeez, Sam. Maybe calm down a little bit, huh? You’re looking a little stressed out. Maybe we should play a traveling game. Like ‘I Spy’ or something.”
“Gary, you don’t know how to play I Spy. Every time, you mess it up and say exactly what it is you are looking at.”
“I do not. Watch. I Spy with my little eye something that is the castle.”
“Gary.”
“Sam has a guess, everyone! The joy I feel is rapturous!”
“Is it the castle?”
“Yes,” he said beaming. “You are so good at thi—Wait. Dammit.”
“This is going to be a long trip,” I mumbled as I led the way to the gates of the City of Lockes.
“I’ll go again. I Spy with my little eye something that is that chair. You’ll never guess. Dammit!”
CHAPTER 12
Six-Inch-Tall Angry Naked Men
with Wings
FOUR DAYS later, Gary still hadn’t figured out how to play I Spy.
Ryan tried to explain the concept, but it was pointless. I didn’t tell him that because it kept him occupied and his attention off me. I still wasn’t sure if I was mad at him, even if he was a self-proclaimed Sam Girl. (I pretended that note meant absolutely nothing to me, even though I looked at it every night before I fell asleep—shut up.) I could feel him looking at me every now and then, but I stared resolutely forward, watching and waving to everyone that passed us on the Old Road. Many had already heard of the dragon taking Justin, but none had actually seen the dragon itself.
The first night we stayed at an inn in a little hamlet outside of the City of Lockes. Ryan was swarmed as soon as we got inside, people clamoring to meet him. Gary, Tiggy, and I ditched him immediately and made our way up to the room. Ryan stumbled in hours later, going for the empty bed, since Tiggy, Gary, and I were curled up on the other one, Tiggy’s legs off the end as he held us against his chest. I cracked open an eye and Ryan had a frown on his face as he glanced over at us. I didn’t know what that frown meant, but I took it as extraordinary judging that he was not allowed on the Cool Kids Bed and therefore was feeling sad and alone and wishing he had been invited.
That probably wasn’t it at all, but it sure as shit made me feel better.
The third night we camped under the stars. Gary tried to tell a ghost story but got distracted by fireflies and chased them. Ryan smiled quietly after him and I wanted to throw my jar of beans at his face.
The fourth day, we came to the fork in the road where the River Hermed (which bisected Verania from the tributaries in the north until it reached the sea) met up with the Old Road. The river itself flowed through the Dark Woods. If we followed it north, we’d hit Meridian City and therefore Old Clearing within ten days. If we took the long way around via the Old Road, it would be three weeks.
The others stopped behind me.
“Oh my gods, are we finally there?” Gary asked. “We’ve been walking for weeks.”
I rolled my eyes. “It’s the fourth day.”